So here we are at the end of season four and another block of ten books (books 31-40 for me). This one took me a whopping 2 years! The published date for Battleblade was 9th September 2024! Got back into the swing of things after a long hiatus after Sky Lord. It killed Sci-Fi in Fighting Fantasy and almost did for me as well it seems! Now the 30s seem to be much maligned in the community but I think its quite a good run. As I do ten books at a time though I ended up 31-40 rather than 30-39 which would substitute Dead of Night out and Chasms of Malice in. That is a huge difference so I do get it when talking about the early 30s. But the second half is excellent.
Usual caveat for the end of season awards in that as much as this is tongue in cheek, I love these books and huge congratulations to the authors, illustrators, artists, editors and publishers. The fact people are still wanting to read a blog about them 35 years later is staggering. And also this is highly subjective of my own personal opinions based on what I look for.
Some tough choices to make here -
Top 10 Ranking -
1. Portal of Evil
2. Dead of Night
3. Vault of the Vampire
4. Slaves of the Abyss
5. Dagger of Darkness
6. Stealer of Souls
7. Armies of Death
8. Fangs of Fury
9. Battleblade Warrior
10. Sky Lord
Honestly the top 4 were so close I agonized for quite some time on the order. Portal was my highest rated though so it got number 1 spot. I wonder due to the time that has passed since I played Slaves that it fell to 4th where as Dead of Night and Vault are more recent and fresh in my memory. All 4 though are some of my favorites I have played and great books. I followed the scores for the rest so the only other decisions was Armies, Fangs and Battleblade as all scored the same. I put Armies at the top due to the unique army mechanic and then Fangs as it was the better written and better executed of the two siege type books.
Portal of Evil edged out the rest to be my favorite of the season and to be honest, one of the best Fighting Fantasy books I have played so far. The writing is excellent, the world feels like a proper place rather than just a collection of locations, and I really liked the way the story slowly reveals what is actually going on instead of just dumping the whole plot on you at the start. There are some great characters along the way, the choices usually feel fair, and I never felt like the book was too difficult with multiple paths to victory. Just so well written.
Dead of Night came very close to taking the top spot for me. I loved the darker tone, the more personal story and the fact that the villain actually feels involved in what is going on rather than just waiting patiently at the end for you to arrive. The talents and Evil score give the book a bit more personality as well, and for most of the adventure I thought the choices were fair and the whole thing moved along really well. Unfortunately, then you reach Myurr's tower and everything starts to fall apart a bit. The teleporting rooms and coloured doors are exactly the sort of maze nonsense I hate, and it is a shame because the rest of the book is so good. Even with that ending, though, this was still one of the strongest books of the season and one I enjoyed a lot. The art is exceptional it in.
Vault of the Vampire was another really strong one for me. The whole thing has a great gothic horror atmosphere, and exploring the castle genuinely feels like poking around somewhere you probably shouldn't be. Count Reiner Heydrich is a suitably memorable villain, there are plenty of horrible little encounters along the way, and I liked that the item-hunting generally felt logical rather than just being a case of hoping you happened to pick up the right bit of junk fifty paragraphs ago. It is still very much a traditional Fighting Fantasy adventure, but the setting and atmosphere do a lot of the heavy lifting and make it stand out. I had a really good time with this one, and it comfortably earns its place near the top of the season.
Slaves of the Abyss was one of the biggest surprises of the season for me. I really liked the way the story gradually reveals itself instead of telling you everything up front, and that made the whole thing feel much more interesting to play through. The atmosphere is strong, the choices generally give you enough information to make a proper decision, and I never felt like I was just wandering around at random hoping to stumble onto the right path. There are a few weaker bits, and the artwork did not do much for me, but the actual adventure was excellent. It was clever, well written and far more memorable than I expected. Probably the best use of the traitor troupe we have seen so far.
Daggers of Darkness is a bit of a strange one because there is quite a lot about it that should annoy me. It is very random in places, there are some horrible blind choices, and Luke Sharp seems determined to make you roll random dice for just about everything instead of testing your stats. Somehow, though, I still had a really good time with it. The adventure feels big, there are loads of different routes through it, and there is always something happening, so even when the mechanics are being irritating it never really becomes dull. It is messy and definitely flawed, but it has a lot of personality and replay value, and I think that is why I ended up liking it as much as I did. I had to check it was 400 paragraphs as there is so much crammed in.
Stealer of Souls was a solid enough adventure, even if it never really did anything spectacular. I liked the slightly more RPG-like feel to it, and once I had mapped it out properly I realised it was actually quite a fair book, with useful items and different routes rather than a single ridiculous path to victory. The writing is decent, the adventure moves along well, and there is not too much here that is actively frustrating. At the same time, though, it never quite has the atmosphere, story or memorable moments of the books above it on this list. I enjoyed it, but it is probably the definition of a good rather than great Fighting Fantasy book.
Armies of Death had one of the best ideas of the season, which is probably why I found it so frustrating. Travelling around with your own army, scouting ahead and actually sending other people off to deal with danger for a change is a great setup, and for a while it feels like the book is building towards something really different. Unfortunately, when the big battle finally arrives, the army side of things never really develops into anything as interesting as I had hoped. There are still some good moments and I liked the scale of the adventure, but it ends up feeling like a missed opportunity. I did not dislike it, but I came away thinking it could have been so much better. It did not need Big Belly Man or Sailor Ian. Well maybe Big Belly Man can stay.....
Fangs of Fury had some genuinely good ideas, but I found the whole thing more frustrating than enjoyable in the end. The bracelet countdown is a clever mechanic, and I liked the way the cubes were worked into the illustrations, but the adventure is so sprawling and awkward to map that it eventually started to feel like hard work. There is also a lot of randomness, and for all the different routes and things going on, the book can actually be surprisingly forgiving, to the point where some of the mechanics barely seem to matter. There is definitely imagination here, and I can see what Luke Sharp was trying to do, but compared with Daggers of Darkness it just did not come together as well for me.
Battleblade Warrior was a frustrating one because there is quite a lot here that I liked. The setting is interesting, the siege gives the adventure a good sense of scale, and some of the writing and background lore is excellent. The problem is that the actual gamebook side of things does not always live up to it. Too many choices feel completely blind, with no real information to help you decide where to go, and that makes failure feel more random than deserved. There are some very good encounters buried in here, but the structure keeps getting in the way of them. It is not a bad book, but it is one of those Fighting Fantasy adventures where I ended up liking the ideas behind it more than I liked actually playing it. And dare I say it was just a bit dull.
Sky Lord was, quite simply, a mess. There are a few interesting ideas buried in here, and the science-fiction setting at least gives it a different flavour from the rest of the series, but almost nothing really comes together. The story feels disjointed, the tone is all over the place, the mini-games and extra mechanics never become much more than gimmicks, and whole sections feel like they belong in completely different books. Perhaps the best example of the madness is L'Bastin disguising himself as a plastic surgeon and giving the Queen a massive nose, saucer-shaped eyes and a pineapple grafted onto her head. That really tells you everything you need to know about the tone of this adventure. I kept waiting for it to settle down and turn into a proper story, but it never really did. Mechanically it is broken as well as I died three times early in the playthrough. The space combat is just impossible. Its also silly but absurdly silly rather than funny silly. It rips off other ideas badly such as fake yoda and the names are terrible. Then the massive tone shift at the end with L'Bastin's fate. In the end, it was not just my least favourite book of the season, but the weakest Fighting Fantasy book I have played up to this point. This should have never made it past the editors.
Awards Show -
Cover -
Best -
I almost gave this one to Stealer of Souls as I love the cover. But this had to be it. Its absolutely bonkers and I love it. As I said in my review, nothing sums up Fighting Fantasy like this cover.
Worst -
Premise -
Best -
This one might seem a strange choice considering where Armies of Death ended up in my rankings, but purely as a premise I think it is the best of the season. You are no longer some penniless adventurer wandering into danger on your own. You are the hero who survived Deathtrap Dungeon and the Trial of Champions, you have a fortune, you are having your own castle built and, most importantly, you have raised an actual army. The idea of recruiting troops, marching across Allansia and eventually leading them into battle against the forces of a Shadow Demon sounded fantastic. It felt like a proper escalation from the usual Fighting Fantasy setup and I was genuinely excited to see how commanding an army would work.
Worst -
Where do you even start with Sky Lord? Being a four-armed intergalactic secret agent called Jang Mistral is actually quite a fun starting point, but then the mission briefing begins. Our villain L'Bastin gets into debt because of his experiments, replaces palace staff with clones so he can steal their wages, starts selling the King's possessions, gets caught, and then somehow finds the time to disguise himself as a plastic surgeon and graft a pineapple onto the Queen's head. It is overlong, ridiculous and tonally all over the place, which I suppose makes it the perfect introduction to Sky Lord.
Artwork -
Best -
You could pick from so many from Martin McKenna's Dead of Night. That's not to say there are not others. Vault was excellent and Russ Nicholson's Skeleton Champion in Stealer of Souls was close as well. But in the end I went for the approach to the Necromancer's windmill. Just sums up the atmosphere of the book brilliantly.
Worst -
It just feels wrong to put Russ Nicholson here but I am afraid bland face on wall gets the nod from me.
The Big Bad -
Best -
Count Reiner Heydrich was easily my favourite villain of the season. He feels like a proper old-school horror villain: cruel, theatrical, dangerous and completely at home in the gothic setting of Vault of the Vampire. More importantly, the whole castle feels like an extension of him, so even when he is not actually standing in front of you, his presence hangs over the adventure. By the time you finally get to confront him, it feels like you have been working your way through his world rather than just heading towards another bloke waiting at paragraph 400. He is exactly the sort of villain a book like this needs. He just edges out the Demon Myurr from Dead of Night who was also excellent.
Worst -
It can only be L'Bastin. The grafter of pineapples.
Menagerie -
Best -
Portal of Evil wins this one through sheer variety and weirdness. There are the usual Fighting Fantasy elves, goblins and dwarfs wandering around, although quite a few of them have been turned into creepy Slave Warriors, but then Peter Darvill-Evans apparently emptied an entire prehistoric wildlife encyclopaedia into the book as well. We get Noasaurus, Phororhacos, Stegocephalians, Pteranodons, Triceratops and, of course, a T-Rex. Then there are Armoured Moles, giant watersnails, Scurrellors that electrocute you with their tails and plenty of other strange creatures lurking around. It is an absolutely wild collection and you genuinely never know what you are going to bump into next. I am still not entirely convinced Peter Darvill-Evans wasn't moonlighting as a palaeontologist.
Worst -
Unsurprisingly, Sky Lord manages to pick up another award at the wrong end of the table. For a book set across strange alien worlds, you would think this would be the perfect opportunity to fill the adventure with bizarre and imaginative creatures. Instead, the whole thing feels like a random collection of ideas thrown together without much personality or consistency. Much like everything else in Sky Lord, there are occasional flashes of imagination, but none of it feels like it belongs together. Considering the possibilities offered by the setting, it is a massive wasted opportunity. And do not get me started on the names.
Most Entertaining Death -
Being gassed to death by a giant fart inside a demonic sphincter.
Final Thoughts -
I think Season 4 was actually better than expected. It got off to a rough start with Battleblade and Sky Lord. Especially Sky Lord, it was absolute drivel. And a few middling entries as well. But four out of the 10 were top quality and I think that is quite a good strike rate at this stage in the series. Story is becoming much more important and the bar has now been set higher.
As always looking forward to the next batch. Getting more expensive to buy though! Hopefully Season 5 wont take 2 years. Id like to finish this off before retirement. Still going faster than Murray at Turn to 400!
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